LEARNING MODULE SURIGAO DEL NORTE STATE UNIVERSITY

MODULE No. 4

I. Title: INFORMATION, CONTROL AND PRIVACY

II. Topics:

1. Information as Resources

2. Information Overload

3. Information control

4. Information Privacy

III. Time Frame: 10 hours

IV. Introduction:

Information can be simply defined as “facts about something or someone that are provided or
learned.” Facts are considered relevant truths which have been validated and identified. Data are
considered facts, therefore, processed data are considered as information as they are organized in such
a way that they have additional value beyond the value of the facts themselves.

But with so much information around, how do you make sure they are safe from illegal activities?
How can we manage it? Not be abused and distributed illegally? With this, learners are able to value the
significance of privacy and information control. With regards to questions, these will be answered along
the way.

V. Objectives:

At the end of this module, the students should be able to:

1. Identify the characteristics of information as a resource;

2. Analyze the phenomenon of information overload brought by high internet penetration;
3. Explain the major points of the revised Intellectual Property Code of the Philippine (RA no.
10372); and
4. Highlight the importance of information control and privacy by creating a video
advertisement/awareness campaign.

VI. Pre-Test: Multiple choices

_____1. Information that is important and useful when it is needed is considered

a. reliable b. accessible c. relevant d. complete

_____2. MP3 files falls under the category of:

a. digital rights b. patent rights c. copyrights d. trademark

_____3. Unlike other organizational resources, information can be described as follows except:

a. transportable b. compressible c. diffusive d. expandable

_____4. A movie being sold in different formats and mediums such as in DVDs, Google play, iTunes, etc.
means that the movie is considered as:

a. non-rivalrous b. non-exclusive c. not exhibiting high degrees of transparency

d. having zero-marginal cost

_____5. Processed data are considered also as:

a. privacy b. information c. resource d. control

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VII. Learning Activities:

1. INFORMATION AS A RESOURCE

1. Expandable – information can be expanded without compromising its integrity. In fact, by having
additional information, much more can be understood from it
2. Compressible – although expanded information can give a more detailed explanation, it may not
always be needed. An example of this is in news sites. Instead of barrage of details, news sites
would often give one-liner headlines that provide enough information about the news.
3. Transportable – information, especially digital information, is easily transportable. Information
can be sent through: email, Facebook, flash drive and YouTube.
4. Diffusive – rumors tend to spread easily. Unfortunately, the same applies to any kind of
information
5. Sharable – since information can be easily spread, it is considered sharable as well.

Valuable Information – Information is said to be valuable if it has the following characteristics (Stair &
Reynolds, 2016):

accurate information is error-free. It is better to trust sites that are formal rather
than informal ones such as blogs or forums. Formal information for your
Accurate research work could come from technical websites as well as academic
websites. Informal information includes blogs, wikis, social sites and public
forum.

Complete contains all the important facts

Economical information should be relatively economical to produce

reliable information can be depended on. In many cases, the reliability of

information depends on the validity of the data collection method. In other
Reliable cases, reliability depends on the source of information, which brings us back to
valuable information being economical.

Flexible flexible information can be used for different purposes. Depending on the
situation, personal information can be used for variety of ways.

Relevant important to the decision-maker. For example, your assignment calls for
searching “parts of a computer” online. You do not visit sites that tackle “parts of
human body” because they are irrelevant to your research topic.

Simple information should also be simple, not overly complex

Timely timely information is delivered when it is needed. This is true in the case of
weather predictions, stock market forecasts and traffic management.

Verifiable means that information can be checked for correctness and authenticity

Accessible information should be easily accessible by authorized users to be obtained in

the right format at the right time to meet their needs

Secure information should be secured from access by unauthorized users

Value of Information – information is considered valuable mainly for business purposes as businesses
depend on it to produce quality products and services. Valuable information helps managers make a
good decision which is why valuable or useful information is called knowledge. Four characteristics of
information as a resource:

1. Zero-marginal cost the cost of producing the first copy of an information good may be
substantial, but the cost of producing (or reproducing) additional copies
is negligible.

2. Non-rivalrous simultaneous consumption of information by consumers is possible

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3. Non-exclusive exclusion is not a natural property of information goods though it is

possible to construct exclusion artificially. However, the nature of
information is that if it known, it is difficult to exclude others from its use.

4. No transparency to evaluate the information, the information must be known, so one has
to invest in learning how to evaluate it

2. INFORMATION OVERLOAD

Information is now available so quickly, ubiquitously and inexpensively. Last march 2016, Cisco
conducted study that by the end of 2016, global internet traffic will have reached 1.1 zettabytes per year

And by 2019, global traffic is expected to hit 2 zettabytes per year. This is because information is
produced at rapidly-increasing rates due to the following reasons:

1. Easy duplication and transmission of information

2. Increase in communication method

3. Growth archives of historical information

Please refer here for additional info about information overload:

[Link]

Mobile Social Media and Mobile Commerce

The abundance of mobile devices has greatly changed the way people manage their day-to-day
activities. In business, for example, having a shop where customers can easily go to used to be enough.
E-commerce is very popular today where you can transact online.

Two new ways scenarios in communication:

1. Mobile Social Media – accessing of the social media sites such as Facebook and Snapchat,
using a mobile device.

2. M-commerce – companies are now using digital platforms to market their products and
services. These may include: Financial services, Mobile ticketing, Service/Retail and Information
services.

3. INFORMATION CONTROL

Information control is about allowing those who have appropriate authority access to and use of
information on the basis of the authority that they hold. It comes in the form of keeping secrets inside a
business or selling IPR (Intellectual Property Rights) to those prepared to purchase it.

Software Piracy – is the unauthorized copying or distribution of copyrighted software by downloading,

sharing, selling, or installing multiple copies software onto personal or work computers (Software Alliance,
2018).

4 issues/problems in information control

1. Convergence – technological advancements and social media have paved the way for media
content such as music and movies to be distributed from their “traditional” distribution platforms.

[Link] – the scale of modern digital speech and content dissemination still greatly complicates
government effort to control information flows (Thierer 2011). With technology and fast internet
connectivity, it is easy for us to access information.

3. Volume – nowadays, news and media outlets abound in print and online. And because of this,
the development can be attributed to the increasing volume of media content and communications
activities happening across the world, greatly complicating government regulatory efforts to control
information.

4. Unprecedented individual empowerment – the popularity of social media has made it

possible for individuals to post anything they want. This creates issues when it comes to content
restriction as most people are doing this using their private accounts.

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Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) – refers to a number of distinct types of intangible assets for which a
set of exclusive rights are recognized. These are rights given to persons over their creation. RA no. 8293
s. 1998, IPR consists of the following:

1. Copyright and Related rights

2. Trademarks and services marks

3. Geographical indications

4. Industrial design

5. Patents

6. Layout designs of Integrated Circuit

7. Protection of undisclosed information

The Intellectual Property Office of the Philippines (IP Philippines) is the government agency
in charge of the implementation of the law protecting intellectual property rights in the Philippines as
provided for under R.A 8293, or the Intellectual Property Code of the Philippines, and the revised
Intellectual Property Code of the Philippines known as R.A. 10372.

Please refer here for more info about RA 10372: [Link]

acts/republic-act-no-10372-an-act-amending-certain-provisions-of-republic-act-no-8293-otherwise-known-
as-the-intellectual-property-code-of-the-philippines-and-for-other-purposes/

Copyrights and Related Rights

Copyrights – is a set of exclusive rights granted by a state to the creator of an original work or
their assignee for a limited period of time in exchange for public disclosure of the work and includes the
right to copy, distribute and adapt the work.

Digital rights – permission granted to individuals to legitimately perform actions involving the use
of computer, any electronic devices or communications network.

Digital Rights Management – used to describe the processes by which the author or publisher of a work
exerts his or her right to control what the purchaser of the work is entitled to do. This represent the control
by which one can prevent a person or an organization from copying, printing, editing, or otherwise making
the privileged information available to other people. The following are techniques designed to control
access and reproduction of online information:

1. Encryption – process of converting data or information in such a way that only authorized
parties can understand. DRM systems for multimedia often encrypt material in such a way that only a
particular device can play or retrieve it, enforcing constraints on how it is used.

2. Serial Keys – also known as a product key or a software key, it is a series of alphanumerical
characters acting as a key to denote that the product or software is original

3. Scrambling – done by hiding sensitive information from unauthorized users. It was introduced
to restrict access to content only for licensed applications.

4. Tag embedding – similar to how pictures can include watermarks to denote information on the
owner of the picture, tag embedding does the same to information content. Watermarks are not complete
DRM mechanisms in their own right, but are used as part of a system for copyright enforcement, such as
helping provide prosecution evidence for legal purpose.

Patent – is a set of exclusive rights granted by a state to an inventor for a limited period of time in
exchange of for the public disclosure of an invention.

Trademark – is a distinctive sign used by an individual,, business organization or other legal entity to
identify the products or services to consumers.

Protection of Undisclosed Information – industries and companies need to have information control
especially in dealing with sensitive industry secret. To protect these industry secrets, also called as trade
secrets, companies usually require employees to sign contracts with non-disclosure agreements (NDAs)

4. INFORMATION PRIVACY

Data Privacy Act 10173 – with all of these pieces of information made available online and the
possible problems such situation may create, countries have come up with ways to protect their data from

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malicious individuals who might use them for illegal purposes. Under R.A. 10173, the law defines
sensitive personal information as:

 Individual race, ethnic origin, marital status, age, color, and religious, philosophical or political
affiliations
 Individuals health, education, genetic or sexual life of a person, or to any offense committed or
alleged to have committed
 Issued by government agencies “peculiar” to an individual, such as social security number
 Marked as classified by an executive order or an act of Congress

All processing of sensitive and personal information is prohibited except in certain circumstances. These
exceptions are:

1 Consent of data subject

2 Pursuant to law that does not require consent
3 Necessity to protect the life and health of a person
4 Necessity for medical treatment
5 Necessity to protect the lawful right of data subjects in court proceedings, legal proceedings or
regulation

VIII. Self-Evaluation: True or False. Write T if the statement is true and F if the statement is false.

____.1 Under Data Privacy Act 10173, sensitive information include marital status, age, color, individual
race and the like.

____2. There are six problems in information control.

____3. There are no techniques in controlling information online.

____4. RA 10173 is the revised Act from RA 8293.

____5. Rapid increase of information is due to easy duplication and transmission of data.

IX. Review of Concepts

Information resources, unlike other resources, are expandable,

compressible, transportable, diffusive and sharable.

Information, as a resource, has four characteristics, namely I

has zero-marginal cost; is non-rivalrous; is non-exclusive; and
does not exhibit high degrees of transparency

Information is produced at rapidly increasing rate due to easy

duplication and transmission of information, increase in
communication methods and growth archives of historical
information.

The abundance of mobile devices resulted in mobile social media and m-commerce (mobile commerce).

Information control is about allowing those who have appropriate authority access to and use of
information on the basis of the authority that they hold.

Intellectual property refers to a number of distinct types of intangible assets for which a set of exclusive
rights are recognized. To protect intellectual properties, copyright and digital rights are granted to
individuals.

X. Post-Test: With your knowledge in this chapter, answer the following questions.

 Make a narrative analysis based on information overload brought by high internet penetration.

11. Reference:

Caoili-tayuan. R R., & Eleazar, M V. (2019). Living in the Information Technology Era. Quezon City: C&E
Publishing, Inc.

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Riccardo Rialti & Giacomo Marzi (2020) Ambidextrous Organizations In The Big Data Era: The Role Of
Information Systems

Volker Boehme-Neßler (2020) Digitising Democracy: On Reinventing Democracy In The Digital Era - A
Legal, Political And Psychological Perspective

Scott Hawken, Hoon Han, Chris Pettit (2020) Open Cities | Open Data: Collaborative Cities in the
Information Era

Muthu Ramachandran, Zaigham Mahmood (2020) Software Engineering in the Era of Cloud Computing

Pooja Singh, Rajeev Pratap Singh, Vaibhav Srivastava (2020) Contemporary Environmental Issues and
Challenges in Era of Climate Change

Dandee (2012) RA 10372 – An Act Amending Certain Provisions Of Republic Act No. 8293, Otherwise
Known As The “Intellectual Property Code Of The Philippines”. And For Other Purposes. Retrieved from
[Link]
provisions-of-republic-act-no-8293-otherwise-known-as-the-intellectual-property-code-of-the-philippines-
and-for-other-purposes/
CBS News (April 1, 2018). Overload: How Technology is bringing us too much information. Retrieved
from [Link]

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